Ups and Downs

Hey there! Well, I figured it was time for an update. I’d like to use the excuse that I haven’t had time, but that’s not quite true. And I mean not true at all. I’ve kinda been sitting around the house for the last week and a half being sick and stuff, so I could have written a novel by now, and by the end of reading this you’ll think, “Beau, this is a novel. Shorten it up next time, bub” and my response to that is that I’m probably going to post around one a month so they might be on the longer side, so break your readings up into little chunks if you want. But I don’t know why I’m even making any excuses right now, no one is asking for them… Let’s start over.

Hey there! How are you my friend! Ready for an update?! Me too! Sweet, let’s up and date you all with my life! Before I start, I hope this post doesn’t come across like I’m complaining, because in reality I just want to be truthful and share with you all about what’s been going on, and well, to be honest it’s been a rough last week and a half, lots of ups and downs, so to fill you in let’s rewind to Friday the 26^th of April. (In my mind, I just heard the VCR rewinding noise. I’m old). The start of this emotional rollercoaster started when I almost got in a motorcycle accident. I’m going to chalk this one on the “Downs” side of my Ups and Downs chart. Basically this taxi-driver was tailgating me and my buddy Tim, honking and just extremely anxious to pass me, which is funny because only 50 feet ahead of me there was another taxi. Oh Ugandan Taxi drivers... He was getting really close so I decided to pull off of the road and I went into the soft dirt (it had rained the night before, and the roads are, well, sub-par here). My bike fishtailed to the left side then back to the other and came to a 35-0 complete stop in what felt like 1 second. Both Tim and I were sure we were going to fly off, or maybe get pinned by the bike, but I'm convinced the Lord was protecting us because we ended up standing upright right over the bike, unharmed, bike was fine and it didn’t hit the dirt at all. I’ve taken a few physics classes in my day to tell you with confidence that we definitely should have at least fallen off the bike onto the dirt. Some guy was 30 feet ahead of us and was just staring at us in amazement as Tim got off the bike and gave a big victory cry. I wasn’t sure if he had fallen off the boda or if he had gotten off. I was sorta in shock. It was pretty crazy.

So we go out to the school and do our thing out there, while trying to shake off the whole almost-dying ordeal (okay it wasn’t that dramatic, but still a little traumatizing). It was awesome because we got to show the Restore video by Join the Lights to the Primary 1 kids who are all super adorable. Here’s the proof:  

And they all sing the most awesome, adorable songs. Showing that video to them was awesome for multiple reasons. One, the video itself is amazing. I wish I could give you the link to it, but because of a few different issues it hasn’t been released. But I would suggest putting on socks, because when you watch the video you’ll need them so that they can get knocked off. Just make sure that while you’re waiting for the video that you don’t step in water with the socks on. That would ruin both of our days. Secondly, one of the Primary 1 students was the star in the video, so Sarifa got to watch all of her tedious movie making come to fruition! That’s why they call it movie magic. So let’s go ahead and chalk that one on the “Ups” column. Then on the way back from the school that day, I got 2 flat tires at separate times. All of this was happening while riding on Hoke’s boda because mine had a flat tire from the day before. A flat tire isn’t the end of the world, so let’s just add ½ for each tire, tallying one more on the “Downs” side of the board. So basically I was pretty emotionally drained by the end of that time. We shake it off, go up to our favorite restaurant, Sankofa, and try to relax a bit.

That night we had a going away party for the 3 film guys at a group of gal’s home who work for Zion Project here in Gulu. It reminded me of doing family dinners down in Corvallis, which were so awesome and made me feel blessed to have a community here that I get to join and grow in, even though it won’t replace my amazing friends back home. There’s something so great about sharing a meal with friends that brings about great community. If you guys haven’t noticed when you read the Bible, Jesus was really into eating with others too. I think he was onto something. But anyways, that was a blast hanging with everyone. This is unrelated, but I realized that night that the ratio of girls to guys at dinner, and also working at the non-profits here in general, is like 3:1. Being an engineer, I’m not sure if that’s ever been the case for me. Let’s be honest, girls scare me. This is a message from one of my Sisters here in Gulu working for another NGO “We need more Men in the world out doing cool things”. Guys, let’s all step up and be the men that God made us to be (which most of you all are already doing). Sisters, you all keep being awesome. As I step off of my soap box, I’ll walk over to the board and add another tally to the “Ups” column after a great meal and night of fellowship.

I get home from our friends house, hop on the internet to see if I am missing any exciting instagrams of what people had for breakfast, but instead I get a message from my Mom with some sad news about my great aunt, but essentially my grandma. She had been having heart issues and the battery on her pacemaker was dying and she was going with it. Walks over to the chalkboard and puts one on the “Down” side. I give my mom a call and we get to talk about it, and she was planning on not replacing the battery and was at peace with going to be with The Lord in a few weeks. I got to see her a few weeks before I left on my trip and got to say bye then, but it was hard hearing that this earth was going to lose one of the best ladies to have lived on it. She prays so persistently for just about everyone and never forgets a birthday of one of her loved ones. She’s by far the most hospitable person I know and loves people so deeply and inspires others to do the same. (Auntie Van, I know my mom reads my blogs to you so I wanted to say hi, and that I love you so much!). I got to talk to her on the phone Saturday night which was so amazing to hear her perspective on the brevity of life and what life is going to be like after she goes up to be with our Maker. During the conversation she says to me, “Beau, I don’t know what praying is going to be like in Heaven, but just know that I will be doing it all the time for you”. I just about broke down after our conversation. Africa has had that effect on me for some reason, I think I’ve been at least 3 times more emotional here than back home. I’ve even teared up during sad movie scenes, which for me is really odd. I rarely ever cried before I came here so I don’t know how to handle this whole having emotions thing.  It’s really awkward in front of the construction workers. Just kidding, I usually hold it together in front of them.

Rewinding half a day (VCR rewinding noise again), I woke up early on Saturday to go take some sunrise pictures with my buddy Kevin. While taking some pictures, we go by one of the restaurants we frequent, Coffee Hut, and one of the waiters shares some news he had heard, that there was an accident in town that morning and one of the mzungu (non-derogatory term for white) girls in town was killed and two were injured. He didn’t know the names of any of them, but said he recognized them as customers. Gulu is a pretty small town to start with, and by this point I had met quite a decent percentage of the mzungus in town. Kevin and I try to investigate but when we show up to the hospital the cop was still performing the investigation and we didn’t want to be nosy in a sensitive situation like this so we just head back to the house. Having that type of information, but not enough details to really mean much was weird and I didn’t know if I should tell everyone and get them worried or just wait until we got more details. A friend ends up coming over and they share more of the details with us. It turns out it was three girls with the Peace Corps who were stationed at a village outside of town and were going on the early bus to Kampala and were struck by a drunk driver. (Obviously one for the “Downs”) Most of us didn’t know any of them, except one of my housemates Lolly had spent the night before with that group. Regardless, it really sucked and it hit close to home knowing that there was a good chance I could have either known one of them, or been one of them. So I spent the majority of that day hanging out, thinking, praying, reading, and just spending time to sit and be still.

Saturday night was the going-away party for the Join the Lights guys since they were (most likely) leaving us for good this time. They had left before, but then came back since they missed me so much, or because they had gotten another job up here. It’s really hard to tell which one. It was tough saying bye to them because of the 6 weeks or so I’d been in Gulu, they’ve been here for around 5 of them. Unfortunately, saying byes has been something I’ve gotten better at and will have more opportunity to practice since lots of my friends here are only here for 3-6 months, so transitioning in and out will be a common theme for my new friends I make here. After a night at our favorite restaurant Sankofa, complete with a showing of their Restore video, it was time to say bye. It wasn’t terribly sad, but I’d say that was mostly because I felt so blessed to have met these friends who I know will be friends for more than these 6 weeks we’ve spent together. Plus they’ll probably be famous movie producers someday so I’ll keep those connections alive so I can be an intern for one of their films or something. They all say I’m really talented at carrying their bags (another hidden talent of mine). Before they left Sunday morning they came over and bombarded our house, saying one more goodbye to us. Definitely a fun surprise. This one isn’t going on the Up or Down side, because it’s exciting to think of how they’re going to continue to go and impact the world through sharing stories of these different organizations and the good that they’re doing. Besides, Christians never really say goodbye, it's always just a see-ya-in-a-bit.

On Sunday there was a “Marathon” in Gulu, which is pretty hilarious in itself. A handful of reasons why: Running for fun is not a terribly common thing around here, the longest distance you could run was a half-marathon (21 km, 13.1 miles), there were I think 7 different types of t-shirts they gave the runners in a wide variety of colors, the half-marathon was set to start “promptly” at 7:30 and the 10K at 7:45, and they had several guidelines set to make sure we wouldn’t get disqualified. Now, lots of this may not seem that funny to you all since you’re probably picturing the Portland marathon or something. Well I’ll do my best to paint this picture for you. There are actually around 150 people who show up to race, I’d say half of those either have jeans or flip-flops on. One of those 7 types of race t-shirts is a polo. Being the good ex-cross-country runner I am, I warm up and am ready for the race at 7:30. I was planning on doing the half-marathon since it wasn’t too hot at 7:30. Well, the race actually starts closer to 8:40, so I decided that the 10K was the better idea. The guy overseeing the race was very strict to make sure we didn’t get disqualified; yet we didn’t even get our race times. I can’t be sure, but I’m guessing the  “10K” was in the 10-12 km range. I doubt the marathon started before 9, at which point it was probably close to 80 °F. I feel bad for the 5 people who actually attempted that, including one girl. The race starts and I’d say I was in the back 2/3 of the pack because most people full on sprinted out of the gates. Well, most of those in jeans didn’t fare too well and I had probably passed at least 1/3 of that pack in the first half-mile. And if you know me, that’s not because I’m an awesome runner, but rather people just started walking after the 100-m dashes they had all just run. I don’t know how long the race took, but I ended up doing relatively well in comparison to the pack, but then again I’m guessing ¼ of the people dropped out. The locals thought the race was one of the funniest things, and we all were the target of several kilometers of jeering. At the recovery station I grab an orange rehydration packet, thinking I’d be getting something close to Gatorade. I think it would have a similar rehydrating effect as Gatorade would, but it tasted like saltwater with a hint of orange flavor. It was quite a surprise when you’re expecting orange Gatorade. But I didn’t want to get dehydrated, so I drink a few of them and a couple liters of water thinking that would do the trick. I also was planning on playing two soccer games later that day so I was trying really hard to have enough energy for those. The race was a ton of fun though, and is therefore going on the “Ups” side of the board.

I rest a bit in-between the race and the games, and then we play our first game. We get informed that during half-time of the game, there would be a track meet at the school.  Yep, that’s Uganda for you. Our half-time ends up taking about an hour and a half, but we got to watch and encourage Gulu High’s finest track members, and encourage those who were, well, not Gulu’s finest runners. I was pretty worthless on the futbol pitch that day, I was slightly tired and thirsty at the beginning of the game, so by the time we get into the second half, I’m pretty beat. I didn’t bring cleats from home, so I had to buy some from in town and got a pair for $16 bucks so I was pretty stoked to have some traction. Ready for an epic soccer story? I was playing left-wing and got this perfect through ball from someone and had a step on my defender. My energy gas tank was on E, but I reached into that reserve tank to get a little extra for this last epic goal. I was planning on laying down on the field for the rest of the game after I sunk this ball into the proverbial net. I’m dribbling down the field, pull just inside the dirt patch (let’s call it the 18) and am picking my upper-V to sink the ball into the goal. I plant my right foot, defender now half a step behind me, and as I go to take the shot the bottom of my cleat becomes un-attached from the front of the shoe and it is hanging on just by the back. This bottom part of my cleat catches on the dirt, half-trips me up and I shank the shot left and then trip. Pretty epic, right?! Luckily, we were already up 4-0 so I didn’t blow it for the team or anything. So we finish up that game and I had told a different team I would play with them afterwards. Originally I was going to have an hour gap in between games, but the track-meet took away that time. Fortunately, they had 15 people for the game so I didn’t have to play in it and just went home and rested. It was a blast, and it’s definitely going on the “Ups”. (Two ups in a row, things are looking good!). Well about 3 hours after I get home I’m skyping with my mom, and I have to abruptly end our conversations saying, “Hey Mom, so I uh just threw up. I gotta go.” Turns out I had gotten dehydrated that day despite my orange saltwater drinking after the race. A couple rough nights and one day of chugging water against my body’s will, I’m feeling pretty good by Tuesday night. It wasn’t the worst thing in the world, but it’s still going on the “Downs”.

Wednesday I was able Skype with one of my buddy from home, and I had energy to go out to the school and catch up on everything there, talk to all the construction guys, the accountant, and some of the students. My stomach felt a little funny, but I figured it was just some residual dehydration symptoms. The feeling only grew over the day and into Thursday and it culminated with another night of throwing up that night. Awesome. (+1 “Downs”) Hoke, Emma and I all came down with some form of this sickness, which was just a blast. We were down for the count for around a week. We did have to go out to the school to talk to our block-making crew and have a meeting with them regarding the way we were paying them. Most of them speak Acholi and some English, but in order to clearly convey the new payment method (or what we thought was clear) it took about 3 hours of standing in the heat with several representatives on either side of the discussion sharing the same info over and over. I was really not feeling well at this point but thought that fainting in front of the construction crew I was overseeing may not be the manliest of moves, so I stayed conscious. The crew didn’t really like the new method of payment and respectfully, and indirectly, shared this opinion with us by suggesting their ideas, which always ended up with them making more money for less work. The discussion was tiring enough without feeling ill on top of it, so I was ready for bed by 6 that night by the time I went home. We were all able to rest the next two days, but didn’t have an appetite at all which resulted in having next to no energy. I forgot to mention, the week before we also were without electricity which made working from home extremely difficult, so we’d have to go charge our phones and computers at Sankofa at least once a day to stay productive. One week and five electricians later, we finally had power by that Friday. It was a struggle for us all to have patience and be loving when it would take 8 calls to the landlord before he would pick up, and then not actually show up all week, especially while not having energy and either having a headache or just feeling light headed. But by Friday afternoon we had semi-consistent power again!

An uneventful weekend passes, and on Monday we try to muster up enough energy to make it out to the school. When we arrive we are greeted with the surprise that the brick-making crew decided to go on strike that day and not make any bricks. Awesome. I was honestly feeling worse on Monday than Friday, and Hoke was in the same boat so we were lacking the patience to deal with this. So we basically gave these guys the option to try out the new system (which actually benefits them although they didn’t see it that way) or they could quit. We were pretty blunt with them because we didn’t want another 3 hour meeting. This one only took 2 hours to hash out the problems. I never like being the bad guy and am definitely more of the peace-making type when I can be, so to have a crew of 15 guys being mad at me and being unsure if we would have workers the next day was tough. (I’m going to tack one on the “Downs” for this whole ordeal) So on Tuesday we get word that all the workers returned and met our quota that we put on them, and it appeared that all was well.

As I write this on Saturday, they are still less than happy with the system, but it’s going to work out well and I think they’ll come to realize that it can benefit them. The sickness is wearing off from all of us, and construction is going alright, or “somehow” as they say here. So things are looking up, but I still have a type of hangover from the emotional rollercoaster that the last two weeks have been. Things are returning to “normal”, whatever that means for life over here. We’re working on finishing a couple new classrooms along with getting our first Primary school building up and running for when the little kids return from their holidays and also getting a nice new building for the administration! It’s so exciting to be here and be a small part of this whole process and seeing what God is doing through this school, the students, the leaders and the staff. We’re beginning to work on some cool things in the school, like doing a radio station of a program put on by the students and led by the school accountant, Joseph. Joseph, by the way, is the man. We get to work closely because he keeps track of the school account and also the finances for some of the construction stuff, so I usually spend at least half an hour hanging with him whenever I go to the school. He is brilliant, hilarious, humble, loves the Lord, and just an overall stud. He also nailed the whole hosting of the radio show. I hope he doesn’t leave our school for his radio career, sports announcing, or politics, but this guy could do whatever he set his mind to. Hoke, Jenna (another restore volunteer), and I sat around eating sugar cane and chatting with Joseph, and the other school head teachers and admin, and got to be a part of some hilarious Ugandan bantering. We’re so blessed with an awesome staff. That’s definitely one for the “Ups”.

Another quick story before I put you to sleep. We had to deal with a hostage situation of sorts this last week. First of all, props to Hoke for how he dealt with this. Hoke gets a call from this guy who says that he has this student held in captivity in his house because the student owes him 300,000 shillings ($120) from two years ago. The fact that it was this guy’s first reaction to take the student hostage to get his money back speaks more to the culture of Uganda than it does of this guy. It’s just a different world over here at times, and this was definitely one of those times. He keeps the student locked up for a day, trying to get money out of him or Hoke, but after several conversations, Hoke talks him out of holding this student hostage and convinces him to relieve the student of this debt that he incurred when he was a 15-year old kid. I was in disbelief this whole time, but at the same time it wasn’t that outrageous from some of the stuff I’ve been a part of here. It is very much an agrarian society here, meaning that everything surrounds having crops, livestock, large families and really a culture centered around relationships. There are some definite positives of this type of culture, but some other things that just make you shake your head. It has made reading the Old Testament much more applicable. You know those sections of Exodus and Leviticus that you normally skip over, talking about how to repay your neighbor when you’re watching their cow and it steps into a ditch, or something like that? It actually makes sense why God had to set down those types of laws and to have Moses judge over the people’s cases seems much more real than back in my Western life of working on 10 billion dollar high-tech construction projects. So bring it on, Old Testament. I’m ready for all your obscure rules about how to cook my goat.

Alright, I feel like I’ve blabbered on for way too long. Congrats if you actually read this far. Internet high-five for you. You’re probably expecting a final tally of the Ups and Downs, especially being the numbers-orientated guy that I am, but I’m not going to tally it. What’s the point? The last couple weeks weren’t the best, but so what? I’m alive, I’m blessed to be in this beautiful country working with some awesome friends. The hard stuff in life is a reality, but the more that we dwell on it then the more we let it control us. We have the choice to focus on the good or the not so good, and I see the past two weeks as a blessing. Being close to death made me appreciate the gift of life that I get to live every day and realize that every breath isn’t guaranteed but it is a blessing from our Maker. Also, my grandma has decided to change the battery on her pacemaker and therefore gets to spend some more time on this earth with us! On a practical level, the dehydration made me realize that I’m not a camel (an identity I’ve been struggling with for years), and that I need lots of water, especially when I put myself through several hours of physical activity in the African heat. Saying bye to some new friends isn’t the greatest, but like I’ve written about before, goodbyes can represent some awesome things, and this time it meant these guys going and changing lives by sharing stories of people doing awesome things around the world. Dealing with the conflict of the construction crew has taught me a lot about Ugandan culture and how they deal with both their colleagues and with those in leadership positions, and I think ultimately will help bridge the gap between the two. There can be good found in most things in life, and I believe that good can come out of all things, but to say that something was good about that girl being killed from that drunk driver is totally wrong. God hates that sort of stuff just as much as we all do, but sadly it is a reality of this world we live in, yet he can work through those situations to bring some redemption from them. When we have crap go on in our lives, it gives us the chance to lean into the Lord or to fall away from him, but when we lean into him he welcomes us with loving arms.  

And for the F.A.Q. section, here is an answer to all the questions you guys sent in:

Q: (insert question here)

A: (insert answer here)

So yeah, that idea didn’t work out so well. I guess this won’t be an interactive blog. I’ll give it one more shot though. Send any questions you’d like me to answer to beaumilliken@gmail.com.  

Thanks for reading! Love you all!